Saturday, September 12, 2009

There’s bad timing, and then there’s this: Instead of a day late and a dollar short, most of us are a day early and … well, money doesn’t even play into it, because we’re gonna die.

Nothing revelatory there, of course. People have been dealing with awareness of their own mortality ever since the first stone-age hunter and/or gatherer — or maybe even his pre-homo sapiens ancestor — figured out what was in store, and began working frantically at constructing a set of beliefs that would allow him not only to continue on after death, but to do so with perks denied him in this mortal, saber-tooth-tiger- and annoying-brother-in-law-infested coil.

But a lot of us alive today are likely to really have our noses rubbed in that vexing mortality thing, because it’s looking more and more as if nanotech-boosted medicinal biology is going to make “life extension” an everyday term. Nanobots will be able to repair the slightest defect arising from defective genes, a detrimental environment, and even, yes, aging. In short, people are going to live forever.

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